Three weeks after TWU Local 291 launched a blistering campaign against Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez, the county offered to resume contract negotiations.

Gimenez’s senior director of Labor Relations, Tyronne Williams, sent a hand-delivered letter to the Union Hall on Monday. Talks are scheduled to resume tomorrow, Thursday, Feb. 15, 2018, at the Stephen P. Clark Government Center.

“We hope that this is a positive sign that county wants to reach a fair and reasonable settlement but we have to be prepared to keep fighting,” Local 291 Executive Vice President Pedro Flores said. “This mayor so far has shown no respect for transit workers and the work that we do. We will keep you all informed.”

Local 291 kicked off a fight-back campaign Jan. 22 with a major press conference at the Union Hall. One of the major demands released at that time was that the county resume contract talks. President Clarence Washington, and nearly 50 officers and members, also blasted Mayor Gimenez for denigrating transit workers and trying to blame them for sub-par service Miami-Dade Transit is providing to
riders.

The campaign has included full-page ads lampooning and criticizing Gimenez in The Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald.
TWU Local 291 also has generated press coverage by a range of television, radio, print and website media, including political bloggers, The Miami Times and Diario Las Americas.

TWU Local 291 President Clarence Washington and TWU International President John Samuelsen expressed our anger at Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez in a Letter to the Editor published by The Miami Herald on Monday, Jan. 29.
“We safely move more than 7 million Metrobus, Metrorail and Metromover riders every month,” Washington and Samuelsen wrote. “It can be a stressful, unhealthy and dangerous job. Making matters worse, Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez seems more interested in denigrating transit workers than coming up with comprehensive solutions to the problems plaguing the system.”

Read the full Letter to the Editor and make sure to show your support by commenting at the bottom of the piece:

TWU Local 291 came out swinging against Miami-Dade Mayor Gimenez Monday for his shameful efforts to blame transit workers for the shabby service that his administration is responsible for.
by launching a new campaign for:

Contract fairness

Respect on the job

Better Mass Transit for Miami-Dade

with a press conference on January 22, 2018.
About 50 members of Local 291 packed a press conference during which President Clarence Washington released a set of demands to Gimenez – starting with the demand that he stop denigrating the workforce.

“It’s quite clear that he is trying to distract people from the fact that he has failed to provide good management, adequate transit funding and reliable equipment,” Washington said at the Union Hall press conference. “He has simply failed to improve mass transit, and that has caused more and more people to drive. A horrendous traffic situation has gotten even worse because Metrorail and MetroBus are not viable options for too many people.”
Reporters and camera crews from The Miami Herald, CBS Miami, WSVN 7 and Telemundo 51 attended the press conference.

Here are the demands for the mayor that President Washington announced Monday:

Stop Blaming the Workers
Transit workers want to get Miami-Dade residents and workers to their destinations safely and as quickly as possible. But they have been saddled far too long with railcars and buses that are old and falling apart, andrequire constant repairs.
The Metrorail fleet, for example, is more than 33 years old. The mayor said the first new railcars would arrive in 2015 and the entire fleet would be replaced by 2017. The first cars were only recently placed into service and the entire fleet won’t be replaced until sometime next year.
The mayor has talked for years about buying 300 new buses but so far only a handful have arrived.

Resume Negotiations
Transit workers have been working without a contract since the fall of 2014. Wages have been frozen while the cost of living has increased. Agreements have been reached with nearly all the other county unions and the mayor should be able to strike a deal with Local 291 if he bargains in good faith.

Withdraw the Request for a $170,000 Raise
The mayor’s attempt to obtain a personal raise - from $154,000 to as much as $324,000 - is outrageous and obscene. The mayor, who is a former fire chief and Miami administrator, already is receiving a public pension of about $134,000 a year. If the mayor wants a raise, it should be much more modest, and it shouldn’t come before his blue-collar workforce receives one.

Stop the Privatization of Bus Service
Miami-Dade residents need good jobs with solid benefits on which they support their families. Creating bus operator jobs with poverty wages confines Miami-Dade residents to lifetimes of economic struggle and despair. Privatization only benefits the owners of for-profit corporations with the political connections everyday Miami-Dade residents don’t enjoy. Limousines of South Florida, which was awarded 14 bus routes last year, is part of a conglomerate that gave generously to the mayor’s political campaign in recent years.

Invest in Mass Transit Operations
Miami-Dade needs more bus and rail service, not less.
Ridership is declining and traffic has gotten worse in part because trains and buses run too infrequently.
Slashing service has made mass transit an even less viable option for Miami-Dade residents and has caused more people to drive.Watch The Press Conference

OURDIVISIONS

TWU 291

Sisters & Brothers,
We need your help! We are having a Day of Action on February 24, 2018.
Please get the word out to your members so we can have a great turn out.
If anybody will be needing transportation, please get us those names asap.
Buses will be leaving from the CLC at 10:30am